The Australian government washed its hands of responsibility for fasting asylum seekers today as a hunger strike by 23 Afghans and one Pakistani entered the seventh day.
Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone brushed aside calls from the main opposition Labour party and refugee groups to intervene to end the protest in the camp on the Pacific island of Nauru. Four of the protesters have stitched their lips together.
An Immigration Department spokesman said 11 of the men protesting against the government's refusal to allow them entry to Australia had been taken to hospital.
He said eight had been discharged and rejoined the protest at the centre, which holds about 285 people.
"The centre is being run by the International Organisation for Migration, they are in charge. It is not in Australian territory, it is on Nauru and it is being run by other people," Ms Vanstone told reporters.
The hunger strike is the latest in a string of protests, riots, escapes, and suicide bids at Australia's five onshore and two offshore immigration centres, which now house about 1,200 people.
Australia has one of the world's strictest immigration policies, detaining all asylum seekers, illegal workers and anyone overstaying their visas in guarded camps while their cases are handled, a process which can take years.
"It is appalling that asylum seekers are driven to such extremes to prove that they have escaped persecution," the chairman of lobby group Justice for Refugees, Mr Don McMaster, said in a statement today.
Australia toughened its immigration policy in 2001 when it sealed its borders to a rising tide of boats mainly carrying Middle Eastern and Afghan asylum seekers and deployed the navy to intercept and divert vessels to camps on nearby Pacific islands.
International human rights groups have condemned its hard line of detaining illegal arrivals, including women and children.
Two representatives from the United Nations High Commission for Refugees are due to visit the Nauru detention centre tomorrow for a review planned prior to the hunger strike.